A senior official of the powerful Yemeni movement now being targeted by a United States-led coalition told Newsweek that Washington’s decision to once again designate his group a terrorist organization will have no bearing on its ongoing attacks in one of the world’s most crucial shipping lanes.
“This decision will not affect our decision, and we will continue to stand with the Palestinian people to stop the massacres in Gaza, just as America does in its support of Israel to continue the massacres,” Nasreddin Amer, deputy information secretary for Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthis, told Newsweek.
The comments came shortly after the U.S. State Department formally announced the decision to label the group a “Specially Designated Global Terrorist” organization on Wednesday.
In a statement, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Ansar Allah’s campaign, which began in November around a month after an unprecedented surprise attack led by Hamas against Israel sparked the deadliest-ever war in Gaza, “have endangered mariners, disrupted the free flow of commerce, and interfered with navigational rights and freedoms” in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
“This designation seeks to promote accountability for the group’s terrorist activities,” Blinken said. “If the Houthis cease their attacks in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, the United States will reevaluate this designation.”
Mohammed Hamoud/Getty Images
The move followed several rounds of strikes conducted over the past week by the U.S. and the United Kingdom, with support from several other Western nations, against Ansar Allah military capabilities in Yemen even as the group continued to claim new attacks—most recently against the Malta-flagged, Greek-owned bulk carrier Zogravia as it transited north across the Red Sea.
“The Yemeni Armed Forces continue to take all defensive and offensive measures within the legitimate right to defend dear Yemen and in confirmation of continued practical solidarity with the oppressed Palestinian people,” Ansar Allah military spokesperson Yahya Saree said in a statement Tuesday.
The U.S. labeled Ansar Allah a terrorist organization in the final days of the previous administration led by then-President Donald Trump. The move was reversed by President Joe Biden just weeks after taking office in 2021, citing Yemen’s “dire humanitarian situation” and concerns expressed by humanitarian groups, the United Nations, lawmakers and others regarding the effects of such a designation on the ability to provide aid to the embattled nation.
Since Yemen’s civil war first erupted nearly a decade ago, Ansar Allah has taken control of up to a third of the nation’s territory, including the capital, Sanaa, and today oversees around 80 percent of the country’s population.
This is a developing story and will be updated when more information is available.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.